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Gender and ICT Role of the World Bank Group

Gender and ICT Role of the World Bank Group. Presentation for PREM Learning Week May 5th, 2006 Juan Navas-Sabater jnavassabater@worldbank.org. The ICT Sector… much broader than Telecoms. WBG Involvement. Emerging. Appli cations. e-Government & e-Business. New. Industry.

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Gender and ICT Role of the World Bank Group

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  1. Gender and ICT Role of the World Bank Group Presentation for PREM Learning Week May 5th, 2006 Juan Navas-Sabater jnavassabater@worldbank.org

  2. The ICT Sector… much broader than Telecoms WBG Involvement Emerging Appli cations e-Government & e-Business New Industry IT, Content & Support Industries The Sector Infrastructure • Connectivity & Access Core

  3. ICT is a High Impact Sector On Productivity On Economic Growth Without investments in ICT, Malaysia & Thailand would have had neg. growth 1995-2000 An increase of 10 mobile phones per 100 people boosts GDP growth by 0.6% 6 4 2 A 1% increase in the number of Internet users increases total exports by 4.3%. 0 -2 US Germany Philippines -4 Malaysia Thailand ICT Investment and ICT Production TFP Other Factors

  4. ICT increases Government Efficiency and Transparency

  5. ICT-Driven Poverty Reduction • Bangladesh: Grameen Telecom extends telecom coverage to rural areas: average profits for village operators (mostly women) are $700 per year--more than twice the country's income per capita • Afghanistan: Driven by a competitive market and $200m in private investment, the mobile footprint already covers as much as 50-60 percent of the country’s population. The sector directly or indirectly employs as many as 20,000 people. China: average income change in villages that gained a telephone 1991-3 compared to change in villages that remained without a phone

  6. Gender and ICT ICT has much to offer for gender development in terms of: • Access to information and services which could save lives (nutrition, health, HIV/AIDS, remote education, etc.) • Opportunity to secure new jobs in the knowledge economy (media, web, programming, data entry, sales, etc.) • Women-friendly working models (can work from home, telecommuting) in cultures which do not allow women to circulate freely and mix with men in the office. • Access to education at all levels and at all times through elearning - beyond what is offered in the face to face traditional schooling system. • Access to micro-credit, possibility to make financial transfers (remittances) • Provides a voice (through email, creation of web sites, chat rooms, distribution lists etc.) for women in ways that never existed before.

  7. Global Mobile Subscribers 1,400 1,200 1,000 Million Subscribers 800 600 400 200 0 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 2002 2004 High income Low & Middle income Mixed Levels of ICT Access and Affordability

  8. Mixed Progress on Reform

  9. Role for the Bank: ICT Enabling Environment Bank Reform Projects Lead to Results… …And Support for Access Works • In the 1990s, Countries with a WB Telecoms Project Saw: • Greater competition • Stronger regulation • Faster rollout • Greater access Uganda: Cellular coverage >>50% population However, remote areas remain unserved World Bank helps develop nationwide OBA scheme for public access ($10m Seed Funding): Objectives: 1) at least one public payphone per sub-county and at least one per 2,500 inhabitants 2) one Internet Point of Presence per district capital

  10. Uganda Village Phone • VillagePhone model based on GrameenPhone’s program in Bangladesh, which was the first program to merge micro-credit products with rural telecommunications • Initiated in 1997 • Currently reporting 125,000 VP operators, 99% of whom are women • MTN Uganda VillagePhone program began in 2003 as a partnership between GFUSA and MTN Uganda following GF country assessment • Uganda has had a universal access (UA) strategy since 2001, and is currently rolling out the first universal access fund in Africa, the Rural Communications Development Fund (RCDF) • As of mid-June 2005, Uganda VP reported operating in 49 of 56 districts with 1,780 VillagePhone operators (VPOs)

  11. Uganda Village Phone Overview Mission statement* : • To establish 5,000 new “Village Phone” micro-enterprises and bring communication to over 19 million villagers in rural Uganda • Aimed to deploy at least 1,000 phones in the first year Goal* : • To provide cellular phones to poor women through access to micro-credit, who will then use the phone to operate a business providing communications services to communities Main Objectives* : • To provide rural communities of Uganda with valuable communications services to enable them to break the cycle of poverty; • To establish a replication model for the Village Phone program; • To validate, measure and document the model in a single country; and • To disseminate this learning to the commercial telecommunications sector and the worldwide development communities so as to establish a global village phone movement. *Source: 2003 SME-GFUSA Grant Agreement, p.6

  12. What has GICT done on Gender issues? • Engendering ICT Study (2005) • Good practices to incorporate gender into ICT projects. Funded by Gov of Japan • Grameen Phone Project Financing (InfoDev) • Grameen Phone Replication Manual for Uganda and Nigeria (IFC) • INF gender indicators to be mainstreamed throughout INF sectors • DEC surveys to include collection of gender-related indicators • Gender and ICT Clinics Training Series in collaboration with PREM, WBI and e-Development Thematic Group

  13. Gender and ICT Clinics Training Series The Gender Dimension of ICTs: Case Studies from Australia, the UK, and Vietnam, January 24th, 2006; Gender and WSIS, September, 2005 Meeting with IT business leaders on the International Symposium, "Women and ICT: Creating Global Transformation" at University of Maryland, Baltimore County, September, 2005 Women Take the ICT Leap: Gaining Entry to Service Sector Employment,April, 2005 Video Conference Seminar - Bridging the Gender Digital Divide through Training at the Department of Women and Gender Studies (WGS), Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda, May, 2004 Offshore Outsourcing of Information Processing Work and EconomicEmpowerment of Women , June,2004 World Bank's Programs on ICTs and Gender Equality with Bank Tokyo Office, Japanese Universities, and International Women's Tribune Center, Australia ICTs and Female Labor Force Participation- Private Sector Opportunities in the East Asia Region, Nov 2004,

  14. Thank You! Policy & Regulation GICT Multi Donor Grant Program Investments Juan Navas-Sabaterjnavassabater@worldbank.org

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